Guild Wars 2

Guild Wars 2: River of Memories
Chapter 1: Lilyia
By: AVM516

“Who are you?”
“Who am I?” The green figure answered. “My name’s Mender Johan. Welcome to the grove sapling, You’ve finally awaken. So what did the Dream tell you?”

She frowned, gazing downwards in confusion, holding her head. “Dream…? What dream?”

“What else? The dream of dreams.” The keeper, said happily, unfazed from her unusual behavior. “Certainly you know of your wyld hunt.”

“’Wyld hunt’? What’s that?” the Sylvari questioned.

“Well surely you jest. C’mon sapling. This isn’t funny.”

She lifted her head to look at him, her eyes squinting with a mix of exhaustion, frustration and annoyance. “I’m TELLING you, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not joking around.”

The keeper laughed, much to her chagrin. “Haha, oh please sapling. Don’t be silly. You’ve just woken, and it’s an important today, you shouldn’t—-“

“I SAID I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT!” She screamed. Her confusion, headache and annoyance by this façade of politeness seemed to break down a wall and explode with emotions she never knew she had.

Everyone in the chamber stared. Her scream bringing silence

“I-I-I’m sorry sapling.” The green sylvari replied with a voice of honest sincerity. “Forgive me. I’ve been doing this so long, I just though—“

“What’s going on!” She fell to her knees, tears suddenly pouring. “Where am I?! What am I doing here?”

As on the ground, before her knees, a small puddle of water was in front of her. She looked into it and saw a face she didn’t recognize.

“What am I? Who am I?”

She gasped and woke up with a jolt. Sitting up on her bed, she held her chest with both hands as she breathed heavily. After a moment, she recollected what had happened and where she was.

Soon after, she sighed wearily and placed a palm over her sweaty forehead.

“Ugh, not again..”

That dream was coming too frequently now for some reason. On top of that, no matter how many times she had it, she always woke the same. She figured she would have gotten used to it by now, but she never did.

No. It’s impossible to get used to it.

As she realized during her time in life, when you dream, when you’re IN a dream, you seem to accept everything unconditionally. As if you’re a whole new person redoing everything and believing everything. Therefore, every time she was in it, the reaction is always the same. It was torturous. And almost every night she was forced to RELIVE that horrendous moment.

She looked at the clock at her night stand. It was half-past 5:45 a.m.

Might as well get up, I’m too riled to fall back to sleep…

Slipping out of her bed, she slipped her feet into her slippers and walked to her bedroom window. With both hands, she opened the curtains bringing in the light of dawn within he room.

Through her window laid the rolling green plains and farmland of Queensdale, painted light orange by the dawn’s early glow. In the distance, she could see a few human farmers getting an early start with their cows on plowing their fields and a few on the road toward Divinity’s Reach (probably to set up their shops early). Very few patches of clouds were in the orange, blue sky that draped over this setting before her.

Despite having such a gorgeous view an artist would dream to have within his home every morning, she couldn’t help but look at the view indifferently as she always did every day. When she first acquired her home, she truly believed the view was beautiful and she felt very prideful of herself when she earned this beautiful place on her own.
But.. As time passed, everything seems to become so stale to her. The effect of her own home seemed to pass by without her noticing, and before she knew it, she found her herself no longer having that prideful smile she once had.

Is this what depression feels like?

She could see the reflection of her face on the window. Her blue face, eyes and wide-leaved hair displaying an emotion she’d been trying to suppress each day. For a while she just stared at it, as if it were two people looking at each other each giving into each other’s grief.

She suddenly shook her head and slapped her cheeks. “I can’t believe this. Snap outta of it Lilyia!” She yelled to herself.

No. She was NOT going to feel this way. It was her day-off and she was not going to let this day go to waste by being gloomy. She had been working hard for the past few months and finally got the vacation time she signed up months in advance. She was going to go downstairs, have a big breakfast, travel to Divinity’s Reach and have fun.

Dedicated she marched into her bathroom. After a 15-minute shower, and dressed in her blue clothed robe, she marched down stairs and into her small kitchen. She checked her cooling unit only to find out it was mainly empty, save for a large covered pot in the middle and a quarter-full bottle of milk.

Lilyia dropped her head in disbelief. Well THIS is good start. Good job Lilyia, she thought sarcastically.

She had been so tired from work yesterday that she had skipped to buy groceries along the way home, and was so upset waking up she forgot she had practically no food in the unit.
Well…
Save for the large pot. But, THAT stuff was too early to eat in the morning…

“Well, might as well make good with what I got.” She reached in and grabbed the bottle of milk, afterward she grabbed the box of cereal atop the cooling unit. As she felt the box’s weight, she noticed there was probably enough cereal left for exactly one serving. On top of that, she noticed the expiration date was approaching within three days. For cereal, that was pretty bad and she predicted the flakes of corn would probably be extremely stale.

Regardless, she took a bowl from her cupboard, laid it upon her dining table and poured the contents into the bowl. With disciplined action, she sat straight on the chair and dug into the bowl with a determined stroke of her spoon and emptied the contents into her mouth. With one puffed up cheek she chewed.

Her eyebrow twitched.

Yup. It was stale. VERY stale. TOO Stale. Even with the milk.
But it didn’t matter. This was her day. She was determined to have a good time no matter what. Even though it wasn’t the steak and eggs she planned, nothing would change. This was her vacation and she was going to have fun by the end of the day.

…Though in the back of her mind, she felt there was something odd in that in the plan, at least the latter part.

How was she going to have fun by herself?

Before she could contemplate—

“DONK DONK DONK!”

“GaCk!” She chocked and spit a little of her cereal back into the bowl. Immediately, she grabbed the bottle and chugged down the rest of the milk to clear away the remaining hard flakes of corn stuck in her throat. Breathing a sigh of relief, she took a moment to recompose her herself and see where the noise came from.

It was her front door.

She frowned. Who in the world could that be at this hour? She thought.
NO way would her work call her back quickly. She knew she was signed up for her vacation. She saw the confirmation form with her own two, blue eyes.

As she looked at the door, a small part of her was telling her not to answer. That it was her work and that she was better of sneaking out the back window to get away.
But she then figured that was ridiculous. There was no possible way. No way, in the history of her employment, have they asked her to return within an 8-hour period (especially during vacation).

Also, why were they knocking? She had a bell, and it worked the last time she used it.

She opened the door, expecting to see a human, a sylvari, or maybe even a charr—

She looked forward. There was no one there.

Or… Maybe an asura?
She looked down—

To her surprise, in front of her (or rather below her) was not an asura. But a short, yellow messenger golem.

No wonder they didn’t use the bell..

“LION-GUARD-LILYIA?”

“Y-yes, that’s me.” Lilyia replied, rather reluctantly.

“MESSAGE-FROM-CAPTAIN-MAGNUS. ALL-PERSONEL-ARE-TO-REPORT-IMMEDIATELY-TO-LION’S-ARCH-FOR-ASSIGNMENT.”

Both her bowl of cereal and jaw dropped with a “THUD.”

“BUT I HAVE THE DAY-OFF!” She cried.

Unmoved and unemotional, the golemn continued, “UNDER-SECURITY-STATUTE-TWENTY-SIX: ALL-LIONGUARD-OFF-AND-ON-DUTY-ARE-REQUIRED-TO-REPORT-DURING-A-LEVEL-B-EMERGENCY-ASSIGNMENT.”

“And what if I don’t go?” Lilyia answered glumly.
Though she had a feeling of what the answer already was…

“FAILURE-TO-DO-SO-WILL-SUBJECT-ALL-APPLICABLE-PERSONNEL-TO-ACTS-OF-DESERTION. LEADING-TO-DISHONERABLE-DISCHARGE-FROM-LIONGAURD-AND-RECORD-OF-TREASON.”

“Are you screwing with me?”

“NEGATIVE. REGARDLESS, A-SCREW-DRIVER-WAS-NOT-EQUIPPED-WITHIN-THE-HARDWARE-OF-THIS-UNIT.”

“….”

“MEETING-IS-TO-BE-HELD-AT-0700-HOURS. SEVERE-REPERCUSSIONS-WILL-BE-HELD-FOR-TARDY-TROOPS.”

Lilyia’s eyes widened and looked at the clock on her wall. It read 6:15 in the morning.

“THAT’S LESS THAN AN HOUR! Getting dressed up, equipped, and traveling to Divinity Reach’s asura gate will take WAY over 45 minutes. I’LL BE LATE NO MATTER WHAT!!”

“THIS-UNIT-SUGGESTS-YOU-PREPARE-IMMEDIATELY. FURTHER-TARDINESS-WILL-ENHANCE-PUNISHMENT. IT-IS-HIGHLY-RECCOMENED-YOU-ALSO-WEAR-A-HUNTING-SIGNET-TO-DECREASE-ARRIVAL-TIME-BY-TWENTY-FIVE-PERCENT.”

“GRRRR—!!” Lilyia barred her teeth and fiercely gripped the spoon in her right hand over her head, as if preparing to stab it into the tiny golem’s eye—

…It took her all willpower to calm down. With a long depressive sigh, her arms and head sagged down, and the spoon in her hand fell to the ground.

Still unemotional, and unfazed, the golemn declared. “BEFORE-DEPARTING, THIS-UNIT-IS-REQUIRED-TO-TALLY-ALL-NOTIFIED-LIONGUARD-OF-NOTICE. PLEASE-STATE-YOUR-NAME, RANK, OCCUPATION, AND-SERIAL-NUMBER.”

There was a small “BEEP!”, and the eye of the little golem glowed red, signaling it was in recording mode.

An eyebrow on Lilyia’s face twitched.
I knew it. I KNEW I SHOULD’VE IGNORED THE DOOR AND SNUCK OUT THE BACK WINDOW!!

The point of the recording was to make sure all the notified Lionguard had gotten the notice. If she didn’t get the notice, she may have had leniency from punishment due to being completely oblivious to the emergency.

But no. This was not gonna happen. She had answered the door like a naïve sprout and was now going to make proof that she got the notice, thereby if she ignored the call she would be arrested for desertion and-slash-or treason.

This was perhaps one of the most painful things she had to do. Or any employed person to do:
She had to voluntarily give up her vacation time.

Without raising her head, she answered in a really low voice:

“Lilyia… Private… Ranger… Five-one-six-one-nine-eight-five…”

There was another “BEEP!” and the golems eye turned back to blue.

“THANK-YOU-PRIVATE-LILYIA. HAVE-A-NICE-DAY.”

Lillith quickly snapped her head up at the golem, revealing a horrific, crumpled blue face of anger, annoyance, and sadness.

“YEAH WELL, SCREW YOURSELF!!” And she slammed the door in its face.